The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy question

The answer is 42.

When a literary work contains lines and scenes that affect popular culture, I'd say it has significance. Think of the spin-offs (both other books and movies/TV) that could lead back to this book. Think of terms that have crept into our culture after first showing up in this book. I'd say there that the fact that the book is still be read today, over 25 years after it was first published, is significant. I think that when a book has been around that long and is still popular (at least in a sense) that it forms part of our cultural literacy. We recite lines or tell about scenes from the book to each other, making those who haven't read the book feel out-of-it...perhaps causing them to find a copy and to read it for themselves. Not all books do that, even the popular books of the day. That is another way that this book is significant.

It teaches us the value of a towel!

It isn’t that significant for SF writing, not in the way some other works altered or changed our understanding of what SF is, but it holds a important status within pop-culture.
The popular Hitchhiker's jokes have become so ingrained that people continually play off them, consciously or subconsciously. It's become hard to meet somebody that didn't know that the meaning of life and everything is 42, even if they couldn't always cite the source for it.
It's the same phenomenon that made Brian almost as popular as Jesus.

How it got to that status is anybodies guess.
Most probably the title just resonated incredibly well with the current times youth.

Hitchhiker's is significant as an sf novel and series because it does something that very little in sf does and does it extremely well. It's funny. It's absurdly funny and yet it has something to say. Its uniqueness is what makes it significant. Other authors have done humor, but most of these have only managed to sustain the humor through one book. Douglas Adams manages to keep the funny going through five novels. His only real fault is an inability to find a satisfying ending for any of the stories.

It's a brilliant, frequently hilarious, work of satire about life on Earth and the absurdity of the human condition and human pretensions. That it also includes marvelous satires of SF as well is largely incidental, I think, but still beneficial to a genre with a tendency to take itself WAY too seriously.

This is a great piece of SF because it is based in a reality everyone can relate to and it struggles with questions about the meaning of life that humans deal with daily. At the same time, Adams does a great job of showing how insignificant earth is in the grand scheme of the universe while constantly adding dry British wit.

What does everyone think of the rest of the series?

Personally, I think this book is pure genius. I love Adam's writing style and his wit. I've never come across a series that is its equal in that regard. There's no denying that it's very well ingrained in our culture conscious. And, most importantly, it's funny as hell.

I think it is. It's just proof that the universe and life its self it just a ridiculous random mess and who cares what the answer is, its just life. Plus its hilarous!

It included God's ultimate message for mankind.
I would say therefore it is not only significant to SF but to life, the universe and everything.

THHTTG was/is significant for a number of reasons:

- It first appeared as a serialised radio broadcast, at a time when 'Young Adults' (such as myself - at the time) weren't really listening to the radio except for the music.
- Ask yourself how many other humorous sci-fi stories you can think of, and how many of those post-date THHTTG.
- If they were published after Douglas Adams' most famous work then I would be surprised if they weren't heavily influenced (or at least inspired) by THHTTG.
- These are stories (as books, audio, TV series and films) that have stood the test of time.
- Ask people of a 'certain age' what they remember of THHTTG and a significant proportion will either mention Marvin the Paranoid Android, or start quoting passages at you.

Regardless of personal taste, and whether or not they are great literature, objectively these stories are significant because they are enduring, were a major phenomenon at the time and have influenced subsequent writing. Douglas Adams' much discussed genius is a more subjective matter, but for those of us who were the right age at the right time and remember THHTTG from the first, remember how it seemed before there was anything else comparable.

Because in my opinion Douglas Addams invented the internet, well the idea of i. Think about it - a book with only one screen and millions and millions of pages, about everything in the galaxy!

In my opinion, this book is significant due to it's outstanding using of absurd. When I was reading it, I felt like I was not able to surprise to anything. Also the permanent smile that this book has been giving me during the reading has influenced on my attitude to this work.

Fran wrote: "Why is this book significant to Science Fiction literature?"

Because the maturity of a certain genre is measured by its ability to make fun of itself.

I think the book's significance lies in its humanity...despite being a work of science fiction whose plot deals with faraway worlds and aliens and so many things that don't exist in our world, at it's heart it's a story about day-to-day Life, the Universe & Everything. It's a hard and hilarious look at what mankind is like and what we face in dealing with each other day in and day out. We're all guilty, we've all been there, we've all done that... even if it's on Earth and not on Betelgeuse 5 or Vogsphere or aboard the Heart of Gold.

Cuz it's good.

He casts an intellectual doubt on all knowledge in order to bring the readers to a personal conviction regarding the things that they know. St. Thomas Aquinas shows that believing something simply based on the authority of the one who said it is the weakest kind of proof. Adams brings people to question why they believe what they believe by bringing many contradictory philosophical concepts into one great book.

At it's core it has some pretty deep messages and ideas about life, gender, bureaucracy, sentience, creulty, kindness, love and he manages to wrap these ideas around absurd, drunk, slightly bruised people and make it funny. Eye wateringly tea spillingly funny.
The only book I have ever read that comes close to the pathos and energy is Terry Pratcheets Monsterous Regement.
I re-read it about once a year because it never loses it's fragile elgance, warmth, irony or humor.

I'd say it is significant because it is a commentary on the absurdity and stupidity that often characterize contemporary culture - by putting modern bureaucracies and businesses into a science fiction setting the points become amplified - subtlety not only can be abandoned but its abandonment becomes a a literary advantage. This is just the sort of satire employed by Swift in works like Gulliver's Travels, only in the afterglow of the space race and television-scifi.

Regardless of the message and social commentary, the profound, lasting cultural impact of this series makes it significant.

The biggest significance of this Book is that with out this story Zaphod would not become President of The U.S. in 2012!!!

ZAPHOD FOR PREZ 2012!!!!

The freaking wormholes that take your pens.

42!!!

In all seriousness, it's stood the test of time. No matter how often I read it (which is fairly often), it's still funny. It's a wonderful way to spend some time.

Add to what others have said, it's sci-fi but it's realistic too. Who HASN'T been caught in Vogon bureaucratic hell? Happens to me every time I go to the DMV. And I've read Vogon poetry -- I have a degree in English. We can all identify with at least one of the characters.

It's just ... good reading.

It's a funny book, but it is also serious. For many people, this book was their first exposure to a number of serious ideas. If it was just jokes, it would have been forgotten.

I also loved the movie even more.

I love this book. I found it to be hilarious and still to this day signifies in a sense what the universe is all about. Probability.

when I read it I didn't think it was that funny but the ideas big and small are amazingly memorable.

When I think about it now it's a completely distinctive piece of writing and comedy, which has gone on to influence many writer, comedians.

It's the first book (that I can remember) I ever read which pointed out the ridiculousness of religion and how bureaucracy ends up being self-justifying and often moves beyond serving any purpose. I was about to become a teenager when I read it first and I suspect it shaped some of my way of thinking ever since.

In that sense, John, it is most definitely significant. I'm sure a LOT of young people were similarly affected.

Vogon poetry...need I say more?

It was significant to me, because I liked reading it and after a while, I enjoyed rereading it. I'm not well enough versed in the genre to speak to a greater significance, but Hitchhikers' Guide is up there with Snow Crash, as far as science fiction books, are concerned.

It has tremendous cultural significance to the British. Douglas Adams is one of their most beloved contemporary autors, and the radio broadcasts it was based on were tremendously sucessful. Plus, aside from the radio play and the books, it has been adapted dozens of times into a television miniseries, movies, stage shows etc, and really has spawned some rabidly fanatical fans.

I think that it probably depends on what you mean by "significant".

I'm not good with timelines, but I suspect this was one of the early genre mash-ups. It mixed sci-fi with humour. All early sci-fi was deadly serious. It dealt with heavy topics and tried to make deep, meaningful statements about humanity or the nature of life. This mocked that very loudly. It is important the way many satires are important. It points out things that the culture takes for granted and shows how ridiculous those things can be.

This is he most fun you'll ever have with sci-fi because it's - Funny! Does that make it significant? Only if you like funny sci-fi...

Determining significance is an act peculiar to human beings, so I don't see a book being significant to an era or genre, only to a person. That being said, Adams' work was significant to me in that anything that can cajole me into looking a some of the nonsensical choices I make or behaviors I've acquired, can change me. That's significant.

I concur with the standard of "How much of it crosses over into everyday life?" Everyone knows about "42" which is now used more often than "grok". But even little things like "The way to fly is to get distracted when you fall." It's the Monty Python of SF, with lots of absurdity, but no(?) magic.
And who could argue that dolphins are the most intelligent creatures on earth?

I think he was one of the first to play at science fiction. After all the "heavy" stuff like George Orwell wrote, this was simply refreshing and a delight to read.

It's significant because it proved once and for all that no matter how transparent you make your metaphors, people still won't realize you're talking about them.

It's as much about what it is to be a repressed and frustrated Englishman as it is sci-fi. It hit a chord because the humour transcended the genre. It allowed us Brits to laugh at ourselves. Something we like doing.

The book "struck a cord" with many readers and continues to "resonate" with them today. The words and images work on many levels from the simple (a smile) to the complex (wow, I wish I had thought of that). And it is harmless (mostly).

It is as "serious" to literature as FLCL is to TV.

Why is this book significant? Quite simply Adams deftly sums up what it means to be an Englishman in the time period the book is set. He sums up the whole mentality beautifully with Arthur. The biscuit eating scene is pure genius and is the kind of daft thing that could only happen here. His sense of irony is the best I have ever found in any fiction. Ever. My life is richer for having reading this novel and indeed the series.

I don't know if it's significant, but it's f**king funny! I read the second book before the first, and the first chapter, "The Story So Far," (a recap of the first book) had me laughing so hard I couldn't continue reading. Every time I recovered myself and returned to reading, I only got through a few sentences before I lost it again.

I see si fi as a vehicle to carry a political message: Heinlin's "Starship Trooper" as an example. Adams did the same thing here. Consider his observation on the three phases of diplomacy, or his statement, "The function of the President is to divert your attention from where the real power lays." This is an excellent vehicle!

I think it's because it's witty and absolutely hilarious, it taught the Sci-Fi genre not to take itself too seriously. It's a great lessons for any genre.

Perfect Me

I wrote Perfect Me as an homage to Adams and the Hitchhiker's universe. So far, reviewers agree that I did it in spades. I'm pretty darn happy with that. I could retire from writing now with that achievement under my belt.

Message me for a review copy.

They're a satire of life, the universe, and everything! I wouldn't go as far as to say they are literary classics, but nothing written before or since has ever been quite like the Hitchhiker series, and that alone makes it significant.

It's not.